“Do you feel comfortable leaving your house unlocked?” Stone asked Brooke.
“It’s locked up tight,” she said.
“Never mind, it wouldn’t make any difference anyway, if they really want to get inside.”
“ ‘They’?”
“Haven’t you noticed that it’s the wrong helicopter? It’s the one that followed us out here.”
“Should I call the police?” she asked.
“What, the helicopter police? I don’t think East Hampton has one of those.” He glared at the chopper. “My kingdom for an RPG,” he said.
“What’s an ‘RPG’?”
“A rocket-propelled grenade.”
Then the black chopper peeled off to the east, and Brooke’s ex-husband’s aircraft appeared from the west and set down on the helipad. Stone and Brooke trotted out to the open door of the machine, Stone ducking, even though he had three or so feet of clearance between his head and the rotors. They boarded, buckled in, and a crewman closed and fastened the door, then they lifted off and turned west, toward the city.
Half an hour later the towers of Manhattan swam out of the smog and, in what seemed like a moment, they were alighting on the East Side helipad, where the Bentley and Fred awaited.
“Take me home,” Brooke said. “I don’t think I can stand any more of you.”
“That’s the nicest thing anyone has said to me all day.”
“I mean I’m sore, everywhere that counts, and I don’t think I can take any more of you until I’ve recovered for about a week.”
“I’ll try and take that as a complement,” Stone said. “Fred, drop me off at home, then take Ms. Alley up to Seventy-Third Street and assist her into her residence.”
Fred dropped him off, he kissed Brooke and said, “Get better soon.”
“God forbid,” she replied. “If I call you and invite you over sooner than a week from now, hang up on me.”
Stone trotted up his front steps and realized he was pretty sore himself. He went upstairs and sought a nap. He had hardly stretched out when his phone rang.
“Hello?”
“It’s Dino. You sound terrible.”
“I’m sore,” he replied.
“Where?”
“Everywhere that counts.”
“That’s what happens when you screw in the Hamptons,” Dino said.
“How did you know I was in the Hamptons?”
“Because you’re sore. Are you well enough to eat?”
“I don’t think so. I just laid down, and I don’t want to get up again, until at least tomorrow.”
“I hear you talked to Lance this weekend.”
“Jesus, is there anything you don’t know?”
“Not much.”
“Did Lance mention how bad everything is?”
“He did. What are you going to do?”
“If I survive until tomorrow, I’ll think about it then.”
“Sleep with a piece under your pillow.” Dino hung up.
Stone fell immediately asleep.
He was awakened by the dumbwaiter bell; breakfast was on the way. He looked at his watch. He had slept straight through the night, a good twelve hours, and he was still sore. He took some aspirin, ate his breakfast, watched Morning Joe, then read the Times and did the crossword. Afterward he showered, if only to keep from falling asleep again.
As he sat down at his desk, the phone rang. “Hello?”
“I’m feeling better,” Brooke said. “Dinner tonight.”
Stone hung up and tried to think of something else. The phone rang again, and he picked it up.
“You hung up on me!” she said hotly.
“I was just following instructions.”
She thought about that. “Oh.”
Stone hung up.
Joan came into his office. “Why do you keep picking up before I can get to it, then hanging up. Is some scam artist pestering you?”
“Something like that.”
“Let me deal with it, will you?”
“Okay, you do that.”
Joan went back to her office, and the phone rang again. Stone watched the light on the phone; it didn’t go out. Joan buzzed him.
“Yes?”
“There’s a Brooke Alley on one. Do you wish to speak to her?”
“Yes, but she has instructed me not to take her calls.”
“She instructed you not to answer?”
“That is correct.”
“Hang on.” She put him on hold.
Stone waited, watching the light on the phone. Joan buzzed.
“Yes?”
“She’s on the line, and she says she’s canceling her order for you to not speak to her.”
“I guess she can do that,” Stone said.
“I think she can.”
Stone picked up the phone. “You just want to get sore again, don’t you?”
“Well, I wouldn’t put it quite that way, but you’re getting the general idea.”
“Tell you what: I’ll call you when I’m not sore anymore.”
“That seems fair.”
“I’m glad you think so. Goodbye.” He hung up, then sat staring at the phone. When nothing happened, he went back to work.
Twenty-Two
Stone met Dino at Patroon. Dino was half a drink ahead. “Still sore?” he asked.
“Not so much.”
“Have you spoken to Brooke?”
“Several times.”
“So why aren’t you with her, instead of with me? I hope you’re not hoping something will happen between us.”
“I have never had that hope and never will.”
“You get horny enough... well, you never know.”
“I know.”
“Why haven’t the Russians killed you?”
“I don’t know. I was half expecting them to try.”
“I guess they think there’s no point rushing with you, when it’s Shep who has their money, and he’s not available to kill.”
“It wouldn’t make any sense to kill him. Then they’d have to deal with his estate, and that could be harder than dealing with him.”
“Who’s he leaving his money to?”
“I’ve no idea. He didn’t ask me to write a will for him, I assume he already has one.”
“Maybe Shep is smarter than we thought.”
“His old man, Rod, is smarter.”
“Than who?”
“Than any of us. You notice how he waited until he had gotten himself dead before he died? I mean, he set Shep up for this.”
“That would presume that Rod knew who he was dealing with,” Dino pointed out. “How would an old man who’d lived in western Massachusetts all his life know about the Russian mob?”
“That’s an extremely good question, Dino, and I wish I had an answer. It’s all very unlikely, isn’t it?”
“That’s what I was going to say.”
“Also, how did the dead hooker get into this?”
“I thought that was one of the cleverest features of this conundrum. Certainly, it was a good way to scare the shit out of Shep, to show him how they had no regard for human life.”
“Did you notice that he didn’t seem scared?” Stone asked.
“Yes, I did. If I’d been in his shoes, it would have scared the shit out of me.”
“Then Shep is a cooler customer than we’d figured,” Stone said. “Cooler than I, at least.”
“I’ll give you that.”
“Also, when Mike suggested we get him out of town, and I asked him if he owns real estate outside of the city or Massachusetts, he came up with the Vineyard instantly. And that setup is an extremely complicated set of circumstances.”
“Almost too good to be true,” Dino said.
“I’ve never found anything to be too good to be true,” Stone said. “Too good to believe, maybe, but not too good to be true.”
“I find that all the time,” Dino said.
“But you’re a cynic.”
“I’m a realist.”